A sense of better things was kept alive in some of the Neapolitans by literature, and by their intercourse with happier countries.

These persons naturally looked to France, at the commencement of the Revolution, and during all the horrors of that Revolution still cherished a hope that, by the aid of France, they might be enabled to establish a new order of things in Naples.

They were grievously mistaken in supposing that the principles of liberty would ever be supported by France, but they were not mistaken in believing that no government could be worse than their own; and therefore they considered any change as desirable.

In this opinion men of the most different characters agreed.

Many of the nobles, who were not in favour, wished for a revolution, that they might obtain the ascendancy to which they thought themselves entitled; men of desperate fortunes desired it, in the hope of enriching themselves; knaves and intriguers sold themselves to the French to promote it; and a few enlightened men, and true lovers of their country, joined in the same cause, from the purest and noblest motives.